Ostrich's put their head in the sand and pretend a problem doesn't exist, not people.

In case you didn't get it there's a problem.

I'm going to fiddle with my 700 BDL varmint by messing around with the trigger with the safety on and see if I can get it to fire. The problem only exists as a manufacturing flaw that might be there on a fractional one percent of the rifles (directly according to Remington).

On the new one I'm getting I'm not too worried about it and will go over it until I'm satisfied it isn't an accident prone one.

I also have to wonder how much of it is people trying to lighten a trigger too much. Remington does acknowledge that the problem existed to a degree, past tense.

1974, I was shooting in the hills with my friend who had bought a Remington 700 ADL .243, we both loved it. I took the rifle from him and released the safety and boom as the catch was released. He looked at me and yelled what the F are you doing? I told him my finger wasn't anywhere near the trigger. He said yeah right you moron. He apologized to me a few months later and said it had happened to him too.

I have no idea if Dave had done any adjustments or trigger work, but it's possible as he's a tinkerer sort of guy. I'm the kind of guy who buys rifles and leaves them at factory settings for the most part unless it's an all out target effort. I have never adjusted my Anschutz or Sakos even though I'm sure they can be lightened significantly. I've had several remingtons I never messed with factory settings.

A trigger thing like Remington is dealing with can't be blown out of proportion, but it can be downplayed by the company that's fighting to save hundreds of millions of dollars. Remington made business decisions involving cost to address the issue versus future liability cost and decided it was more cost effective to pay out over time than to fork out a few million dollars at the time. Dupont never would have sold the company in such a timely manner had they not seen impending tens to hundreds of millions in liability. You can't have thousands of complaints about something that doesn't have it's facts behind the issue.

I'm buying a newer 700 varmint and I'm not tripping about it, but I will check it out and be extra careful. My eyes are open and I'm aware of a potential for problems.

Picher

December 2, 2010, 02:56 PM

I've worked on many Rem 700 triggers and found that most of the rifles that had problems are either quite new and haven't been broken-in, or older rifles that someone sprayed WD40 into, causing it to not return fully upon cocking.

I did adjust a friend's very new varmint model to a very short, light pull, against my better judgement, and it malfunctioned. I had warned him about the newness, but he forgot I told him to check it after using it a bit and to back off the engagement screw (rear screw) a half-turn if it fails the bump-test. He's never had any more problems since break-in.

IMHO, Remington 700 triggers do need a bit of breaking-in, say about 100 dry-firings (hopefully using a snap-cap), before making any adjustments. They should also be cleaned with something like Gun-Scrubber to get rid of any filings or gunk from the factory.

And yes Virginia, just like any other man-made mechanism, there are some bad triggers that leave the factory, but that goes for about all brands.

woodguru

December 2, 2010, 03:46 PM

I'm getting ready to order a new Varmint 700 so I appreciate the words on your friend's. Would it be okay to dry fire to help break it in, or possibly manipulating the safety on and off through bolt cycles? Safety on, off, bolt cycle should smooth the safety up and give me a feel for how solid it seems to be huh?

I play around with new firearms because I can notice the difference from new to smoothed out through cycling dry. Also I can check the wear surfaces to see if some smoothing is in order. I generally don't goof with a sear or factory trigger set weights unless it's inordinately bad.

jimbob86

December 2, 2010, 03:58 PM

It definitely happened to me on my 700 mountain rifle (7mm-08). Was lucky the barrel was pointed in the treetops when I released the safety from safe to fire. Boom!

You ever clean that?

warbirdlover

December 2, 2010, 07:13 PM

They should also be cleaned with something like Gun-Scrubber to get rid of any filings or gunk from the factory.

I can't believe Remington would let guns out of the factory with filings or gunk in the triggers. If they're like any normal manufacturing plant the parts go through a washer before going on to assembly.

I mean it can't hurt to clean it but if some garbage comes out I would be surprised, especially with this issue over the years. And WD40 is the worst stuff I've ever used. I've never used it on guns as it dries and gets sticky SOON after applying.

woodguru

December 2, 2010, 08:40 PM

I just have to interject here, a production rifle of Remington's stature should be able to be used, abused, and fired most continuosly until it dies from never being cleaned and a misfire when releasing a safety on rifle, touching the bolt, or any other move not related to directly pulling the trigger should NEVER cause the gun to go off.

I'm sorry, most of the other big companies seem to have done that and so should Remington have. It doesn't even make sense to defend a company that of their own conscious free choice related to economics chose to defend a bad position and quietly pay out gag order attached settlements rather than bite the bullet and fix the friggin thing.

I had a bird food business, I chose to address the occassional bad batch product liability with recalls and replacement (it happens occassionally). Most of my competitors found it cheaper to field complaints and liability as it came in. Customer loses $50k worth of birds, you turn it to your insurance company who settles at $35k and binds the person with a gag order that makes them liable for hundreds of thousands in liability if they ever divulge any detail of the case or settlement.

It was costly replacing product but not that bad, a single bad lawsuit judgement can amount to the total cost of fixing a problem as evidenced by the $17 million paid out in one suit. Had Remington aggressively addressed their problem when memos first made them aware the guy that won the $17 million would never have gotten hurt. And you know why he got that much? He was an oil executive with huge money and decided to push it to the max, the others typically don't have the resources so they get chump change settlements.

Had Remington had my attitude about fixing problems versus holding out and playing turtle lives would have been saved, if it was on your watch that a rifle misfired and it killed your wife or kid through a wall you would want blood too.

Don't defend the actions of CEO's who made bad decisions. It's impossible to make too big a deal out of this.

Warbirdlover
The problem was more like injection mold marks that act as interference than dirt, this possibly lets dirt and debris get into the mechanism better. But that said a rifle prone to doing it will do it when new. Don't assume this is only cases of dirty, abused, and tampered with rifles, that remington's defense spin and they do have to spin one, don't they? :) That's the only position they can take and they have to hope that a lot of people who haven't had it happen to them buy it, because the victim's sure aren't.

Jt1971

December 2, 2010, 10:06 PM

I have had a few of these 700s do the same like in the videos where you dont touch the trigger and then boom. Thank God it was pointed down range.

mrgoodwrench76

December 2, 2010, 10:23 PM

To the OP, I dont know if Remingtons new stuff has the same problem or not as I'm not willing to take the risk. I do know that none of dozen or so Savage rifles I've ever owned have any such issues, nor do I hear of any cases reported as such. Wonder why that is?